A group of teenagers is travelling home from their high-school graduation party when the car they’re travelling in crashes into a brick wall. The consequences are devastating and far-reaching, not just for them but for their families, peer group and members of the wider community. Although no one is left unaffected, some are more deeply affected than others, not just as a result of physical injuries but also because of the profound psychological impact on everyone involved. People want to know why the accident happened and who was to blame. Who needs to take responsibility for the crash? How should they be punished? But how could any punishment ever feel adequate to compensate for the life-changing effects of this trauma?
The opening chapter, set thirty-two days after the accident, describes a very moving scene which informs the reader that one of the young people has died, although it’s not until much later that we discover who it is. The emotionally charged impact of these first two pages, one of the most powerful I’ve ever experienced at the start of a book, immediately drew me into the story. It also acted as a warning that what would follow would be probably take me on a tension-filled, emotional roller-coaster of a journey as I learnt more about the characters, their backgrounds and the events which preceded the crash. This demonstration of the author’s ability to capture the very essence of human behaviour and emotion set the scene for her sensitive, but unflinching, explorations of the impact this tragic accident will have on everyone involved.
The early chapters of the book introduce all the main characters and cover the crash, with all the shocking, unforgettable scenes which face the early witnesses, particularly Pete, the local resident who heard the crash and was first on the scene to try to help and comfort the injured. With the immediacy of modern technology, the first photos of the crash appear on social media just sixteen minutes later, making parents across the community desperate to make contact with youngsters who were still out, to receive confirmation that they were safe. For most their prayers are answered but five families are faced with a frantic drive to the hospital, only to be directed to a small waiting room where they must face an anxious wait to discover the fate of their child. Eventually the parents’ names are called, one by one, and they are taken to discover how badly injured their child is, but the almost unbearable tension which developed as they waited was captured in what felt like a real-time scenario – I felt like pacing the room as I waited with them, sharing not only their desperation to find out, but also their visceral fear that finding out will possibly confirm what they most dread hearing.
Two of the youngsters are transferred to ICU and the scenes as their parents maintain their vigil in this clinical space, surrounded by machines and feeling totally powerless, are captured in an equally tension-filled and powerful way. The differences in the severity of the injuries sustained by each of the victims provided an opportunity for the author to explore the conflicting feelings people can have when they discover that their loved one is one of the “lucky ones”. The huge sense of relief is often accompanied by feelings of shame as they wonder whether their good fortune has been gained at someone else’s expense. However, for all involved, the question “why me, why not them?” can feel pernicious when the people know each other well and have previously enjoyed good relationships.
Told from alternating perspectives, the story then follows the personal journeys of the surviving teenagers, their parents and their siblings as they struggle to cope with the physical and emotional repercussions of how their lives were, in just one split second, irrevocably changed. The different ways in which each of them reacts to the traumatic experience and copes with the aftermath enabled the author to explore a range of immediately recognisable reactions to sudden tragedy – confusion, blame, anger, regret, different aspects of loss, grief, overwhelming sadness, a desperate clamour for retribution, for someone to be held to account, for punishment etc. She highlighted how people cope with loss, grief and bereavement in a range of different ways and that these differences can so easily create emotional rifts between them, rifts which can seem impossible to bridge, leaving each individual feeling isolated with their grief and vulnerability at a time when they are most in need of loving support. These explorations allowed her to demonstrate that there’s neither a “blueprint” for dealing with grief and loss, nor is there a “timetable” for how long the process should take. Each individual must face their own journey and, in their own time, find resolutions which will bring them a level of peace and acceptance. The characters in the story discover the cathartic effects of being able to be truly honest in expressing their feelings, whether positive or negative, both to themselves and with others. It’s never an easy process but it is only through this honest reassessment of relationships that they’re able to achieve a resolution which enables them to move towards a more hopeful future.
A major theme which ran through the story focused on forgiveness and whether, in the face of devastating loss and pain, it’s possible to forgive someone whose actions have changed your life forever – but if you can’t, what will you do with all your rage and resentment? One way the author explored this was through tracing how two characters (one parent and the teenage driver) used the Restorative Justice system to attempt to find both understanding and some closure. She used her perceptive understanding of the complexity of this issue to present a moving and entirely credible account of each person’s motives for agreeing to meet, their reactions when they finally came face to face and the eventual outcome of their encounter. In a similar way she used the story to look at the question of organ donation. When relatives are in a state of shock and pain in the immediacy of the death of a loved one, this is a request which whilst important if the lives of other families loved ones are to be saved, requires huge sensitivity on the part of the medical team. She showed that, if people do feel able to offer this “gift of life”, at some point in the future this will probably become a source of comfort, a sense of something life-affirming coming from their personal loss.
This is an insightful and compassionate exploration of tragedy and its aftermath, with the emotional journeys of each of its complex and totally credible characters being convincingly portrayed – I really appreciated the fact that Pete, the first character we meet, reappears at the end of the story, allowing us to see how he has coped. Although heartrendingly sad at times (I was often in tears, but I found myself sobbing at the end of the final two pages), it is a story which is also full of love and hope and I recommend it without reservation. It would be an excellent choice for book groups.
With my thanks to Corvus and Real Readers for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. ( )